Contrary to the American political tradition, where "federalism" is a concept with positive connotations, the French experience offered a different meaning. The term may have been used as a slur for the first time following the French Revolution of 1789, when cities across France witnessed uprisings against the Jacobins and the "Committee of Public Safety."
Most of the insurgents were sympathizers of the more moderate Girondins, refusing the centralization of all power in the capital, Paris, and the denial of any authority to the 82 other French Departments. And so, their radical rivals labeled them "federalists" when they would accuse them of seeking to divide the nation and the state, before mercilessly crushing their uprisings.
This experience left a mark on modern French history and rendered France, with its adoption of centralization, the biggest exception to the federalism opted for by most European countries. It thereby establishes the discourse of maligning federalism, as well as division, secession, and fragmentation, which are all portrayed as synonyms.
However, it is worth noting that later on, the term was used to express disapproval more frequently in the countries of the "Third World," in which the desire for unity exists side by side with the weakness of this unity’s components, than anywhere else.
Today, this trajectory is moving forward with unprecedented force, at least in the Arab Levant. Those behind its malalignment do not vilify federalism because of their commitment to stringent Jacobin centralism; they do so from fragmented states defined by division whose central governments are atrophying, as we can see in Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq. Even those who openly support extreme centralism, as well as the tyranny and arbitrariness it implies, have become incapable of maintaining it, as reflected by the overall situation in Syria, but also in Iraq.
In fact, it can be said that, broadly, the worse things get in the Levant, the stronger the tone with which fragmentation and division, which colonialism is said to foster, are denounced. It's as though, amid the storms of mythic consciousness relentlessly blowing our way, we are reaffirming the validity of the meaning behind the famous (and accurate) phrase mocking Polish anti-Semitism: the fewer the Jews there are, the stronger anti-Semitism becomes.
However, atrophy and myth are not entirely ineffective, and to a large extent, that is due to our inherited discourse glorifying unity and denying its crises.
For instance, in Lebanon, the defeat of the state has yet to be fully acknowledged, and nor has the victory of the militia. It is true that the masses sense and understand this reality ("there is no state" has become a cliche), but those preoccupied with electing a new president are becoming increasingly preoccupied by this pursuit, or increasingly keen to ensure that their grievances about the unconstitutionality of the parliamentary speaker's actions are put on the record, believing that they are making a difference on public life by doing so. Thus, they are behaving and making their bets on the assumption that the state exists and merely needs to be rebuilt and have its unity reinforced.
On the other hand, Hezbollah continues to stress that its sole concern is resistance and "protecting Lebanon" - it would never intervene, God forbid, in other affairs tied purely to the state.
We know, given the countless experiences that are now behind us, that litmus tests of loyalty to a single state are determined by neither "declarations" of fealty to it, nor coupling them with "declarations" of respecting the Taif Agreement. Rather, they are determined by solid and tangible concessions to other groups that affirm the prioritization of coexistence and putting the interests of all communities over the interests of any particular community. This, however, is not at all on the agenda.
Thus, the most realistic among the various statists are those calling on Hezbollah to govern the country directly and take its establishment of a state to the end, with no pretenses or claims to duality, thereby ensuring the "unity" being pursued, which is the only "unity" possible. Nonetheless, for many well-known reasons, no one says this.
However, declaring that the state is not dead and turning one’s attention to satirizing federalism, division, and other such "diseases," help and serve only one party: Hezbollah. Doing so, during the few periods of peace, allows the party to play the role of a humble and innocent organization that wants nothing but to protect a country that it loves and remains faithful, seeking nothing in return. During times of war, it allows the party to drag a "united" country into its battles, using the “entire” country as fodder for its wars. Any slackers are deemed traitors to this single nation and single state!
In other words, emphasizing a simple form of unity and satirizing its opponents merely solidifies the militia's control while absolving it of responsibility. This claim, with only minor differences, is equally applicable in both Iraq and Syria. The unity of these countries has suffered the same fate as the Palestinian cause, whereby Palestine was killed and its cause immortalized. This cause has become, among other things, an asset for militias and regional ambitions, and material used to kill, extort, and subjugate Palestinians.
The fact remains that those benefiting from this approach, and from the skeleton of unity, are not Jacobins who were influenced by Rousseau and adore unity and centralism, but militias that rip everything apart and raise the banner of unity high- anyone who says otherwise is a traitor.
